DISCLAIMER: I don't own PJO or Avenger/Marvel. Neither do I own any of their characters. Only thing I claim to own is my characters and plot.
..::When You Need Help::..
..::Nine::..
"I'm just saying, Tony. Something about this kid just doesn't feel right." Steve Rogers walked along with Tony keeping in step with him.
They'd taken a jet to Kentucky straight from New York. When they arrived at the base it caused quite a few heads to turn. It wasn't that common to see Captain America walk by them. Iron Man too, of course.
Steve was equally surprised by the amount of agents roaming the halls. He side stepped a bustling worker who had little care who Steve was. He nearly plowed him right on through or would've gone down trying.
Steve heard a cough on his right. "Well, he did cause a near tsunami in the middle of New York." Tony said offhandedly. "So, I'd say your moral meter is still in tip-top shape."
"Not what I meant." They turned down another hall as Tony rolled his eyes. Steve continued nonetheless. "I talked with him for a bit before the attack. He didn't seem like the super villain you guys are painting him to be."
"I don't think he's a 'super villain.'" Tony looked down a different hall as they passed it. "But I do think he'd cause some serious damage if he was."
He turned his gaze at Tony for a couple quick moments. But then returned it to it's original gaze. "That's a fair assumption."
The hallway ended at a double door with no security box. Steve walked through the door and held it open for Tony to enter.
They made it about five feet before hitting a collision course with another agent who was walking out.
"Sorry," the man mumbled without stopping. He went out the doors they'd just entered through.
Neither of them really paid much mind to him and just continued on. Currently there was only two people beside Tony and Steve. Both of them were women and stood at the desk across the room. As Tony and Steve made their way closer both made notice of them.
"Good afternoon, gentlemen." This was the lady behind the desk. "Is there something I could help you with?" She put on a polite smile and Steve returned the gesture. He looked at her name tag and read the name Marissa.
"We're here for an agents file. We were told 'We'd find it here.'" Steve rested his hands on the desk counter. "Could you possibly point us to where you keep all your hard copies?"
"I'd point you right back out the door you came in." Marissa kept her polite smile despite Tony's bitter facial expression. "Rebuilding was no neat task. All files down there have been tossed and stirred over the past two years." She turned in her chair and put something in a drawer to her right. "Chances of you finding your file are very minimal. That's not even including the risk of damaged documents."
Tony quirked an eyebrow. "Damaged?"
The other woman standing on the other side of the desk switched her stance so she faced them. "I've heard some people say 'there's been quite a few water leaks down there.'" Was what she chimed in.
Steve twisted to glance back at Tony. But Tony just shrugged with a bored expression.
Steve turned back to face the two women. "Why has no one tried to fix it up?" he asked both of them.
"Nothing important is down there. Just a bunch of random dohickys and what-nots." Said the woman nonchalantly. She had spoken while messing with her nails.
Tony made a ringing noise then stepped forward to the desk next to Steve. "Well, sounds like we got our work cut out for us." He raised his eyebrows and took a quick look around. "Which way did you say?"
Marissa let out a sigh and brushed a few rebellious hairs out of her eyes. Tony noticed they were two different colors. "It'll be on your left, take the stairs all the way down and their should be a low clearance door right before you enter."
Steve nodded her way. "Thank you." Before walking towards the hall with Tony he turned back to the other woman. "Good day, ma'am."
"And to you as well." She smiled with a nod.
Steve then joined Tony as they made their trek down the staircase. After walking down the sixth flight of stairs, they were both wondering just how far down this was. Apparently just enough, they came to the door after the eighth flight of stairs.
Tony bumped his wrist device against the security box and the door unlocked with no problems. Once the door was fully opened by Steve they could see what a mess it was.
File cabinets were filed out in endless rows. Many papers were strewn on top of them and scattered on the floor. Along the ceiling were multiple long lights that blared their florescent colors. There was one light in the middle that flickered on and off in a unknown pattern.
Steve let out a long whistle. "Looks like a fight went down in here."
Tony squatted down and saw a scorch mark on the side of a cabinet. "Maybe two." He rose back up to his original stance and brushed his hands against his pants.
They both walked down two isles next to each other while taking in their surroundings. Steve closed a couple drawers as he walked. "Where should we start?" He asked while making a full turn.
Tony looked down at his wrist device. "I don't think we'll have too."
Steve raised an eyebrow with no words to accompany it. When Tony raised his gaze to him he just rolled his eyes. He pulled out a small disc from his pants pocket and raised it so Steve would be able to see it.
"I think JARVIS should be able to find what we're looking for."
Steve gave the disc a long hard stare. Nothing too intimidating, though. "You brought a mini JARVIS?"
"What? Did you really think I was gonna spend hours trying to find his file?" Tony tapped two things on his wrist before tossing the disc into the air. "Come on, you know me. Ambitiously lazy."
The disc flew only a couple feet before hovering mid air. A small sphere floated out of the center of the disc and stayed with it as it balanced out. When the sphere glowed a soft blue a calm voice rung out.
"Good afternoon, sir. How may I be a service?" JARVIS asked politely as always.
"Somewhere in this poor excuse of a storage room is a file on that guy from earlier." Tony ran a hand through his hair lazily.
JARVIS hovered high to where he was about a foot above the cabinets. "Would you like me to find it?"
Tony rolled his eyes. "Nah, I was hoping for some 80's music." He stated sarcastically.
"Right away, sir."
The rim of the disc glowed a soft purple and Michael Jackson's 'Beat it' started to play.
Right when the king of pop's voice started off on the first verse, Tony made eye contact with Steve then returned his gaze back to the mini AI.
"JARVIS, what are you doing?" He asked while rubbing his the bridge of his nose.
"Well, you said-"
"-Why would I actually want 80's music, JARVIS?" Tony turned away from his AI and picked up a random file off of a cabinet.
The robotic butler hovered over a row of cabinets to another walkway. In a mumbled voice he said, "I find this song to be rather catchy."
Steve conveniently coughed into his fist to cover a up a chuckle. Meanwhile, Tony grunted and tossed the file back where he found it. "Just find the file, please."
"Well, since you said 'Please.'" JARVIS buzzed off to the opposite end of the room and started using his scanner back and forth among the files.
As he worked, it almost sound like he was humming along to 'Beat It' for the remainder of the song. Both Steve and Tony searched the files as well. Neither of them were really expecting to actually find the file, but it was better than standing around.
Tony picked up one file about a vigilante dressed in red roaming around New York. As he read on he was more intrigued. So he used his wrist device to scan the file to read over later. As he finished scanning the last page, He heard his AI from a few rows over.
"Sir, I believe I've found what you were looking for."
Tony closed the file and threw it back into a drawer. He heard Steve shuffle along in between some loose papers as well. JARVIS hovered with a light shining on a thick file laying on top of a cabinet.
Tony picked up the file and brushed it off a little to read the cover.
"Johnson, Peter." JARVIS read out the name on the file's tab. "There are approximately four other agent files under the same name."
Steve looked at the file over Tony's shoulder. "How'd you know this was the right one?" He asked curiously.
"The others are all deceased."
"Oh," Steve said meekly. "Well I guess that helps."
Tony ignored them as he took a deep breath in and blew off a thin layer of dust on the file. Right before he opened it, he brushed it a few more times with his hand.
Inside was Peter's picture. Listed beside it was his name, age, and current address. On another page there was the rest of his file that the digital one did not have.
There was his entrance exam, -Physical and Mental.- There was his scoring of all classes at the Academy, even his dorm number was listed along with his roommates. But under relatives, none were listed.
Steve skimmed through the first page before speaking again. "This kid has a very interesting file."
"Yeah," Tony agreed as he flipped the page and peaked at the other side. "JARVIS, you mind." He pointed the file up and down.
From the small disc a beam of light lit up across the whole page and scanned it up and down. Tony flipped the page and JARVIS repeated the action. JARVIS scanned a total of four more pages before turning off his scanner.
"All done, sir." JARVIS announced as he hovered a little lower.
"Great." Tony tossed the file on top of the cabinet and a cloud of dust rose where it landed.
Steve had stayed silent most of the time. At first he wasn't quite sure what JARVIS was doing. But after the second scan he had remembered Tony was still Tony and preferred all things digital.
He cleared his throat. "We need anything else before we go?" Steve asked Tony with a raised eyebrow.
Tony had his wrist device on and was now swiping through all the pages projected in miniature holographic form.
He zoomed in on one page before responding. "Don't think so." He made the device turn off and the hologram blinked out quickly.
With everything they had come for,- and then some.- They left the storage room and ascended the staircase back to the lobby.
When they started to walk up the seventh flight of stairs, Tony had turned his wrist device again and skimmed over Peter's file. He was reading over page 3 that listed most of his medical information when he voice one of his thoughts floating through his head.
"It's interesting that nothing stood out in his DNA."
Tony and Steve walked out into the lobby and made their way towards the exit. But Steve stopped witch made Tony follow in suit.
"Maybe someone switched it." Steve suggested. "Used to happen sometimes in my day."
Tony shook his head. "Unlikely. Things like that are a lot harder these days."
Steve let his hands hit the sides of his legs as he tried to think further into this. "What else could it be?"
"Well, if he's an Inhuman," He paused as he thought about it more. "Maybe he's able to alter his DNA."
Steve wasn't entirely convinced. He just raised an eyebrow with no reply. It only took a few seconds until Tony came up with another idea.
"Fine, just to make you happy. We'll go see whomever did his physical test."
Steve smirked. "Now there's a plan." He continued walking toward the double doors across the room.
Tony followed as he swiped through a few pages on his wrist device. When he found what he was looking for, he then zoomed in on the bottom left corner.
"Signature says 'Piper McLean.'" He quirked an eyebrow as he read further. "She's done all his Physicals."
"Is that common?" Steve asked as he reached to open the door.
"Not usually." Tony walked through the door Steve held open.
Steve walked next to Tony as the door closed behind them. "Why don't we pay her a visit."
"Yes we shall."
As they made their way out of the Paper Tower, JARVIS buzzed behind them with another 80's song blaring out. It was Dead or Alive's 'You Spin Me Round' to be exact.
"JARVIS!" Tony snapped at the AI.
The music shut off right before it got to the chorus.
..::..::..::..::..::..
After some time, Tony and Steve managed to find there way out of the building. To be fair, Tony insisted he remembered the way back.
But now they were both back in the jet already up above the clouds.
"So," Steve stood up from his seat in the back of the jet and walked towards a screen on the wall. "Where does this," He gestured at a screen helplessly which showed an agent's ID picture.
"Piper McLean." JARVIS chimed in.
"Thank you," Steve nodded at her picture before turning back around to face Tony. "Where does she live?"
"Well," Tony didn't even lift his gaze from a small screen he held in his lap. "It says she lives in Cali, but she's currently based a hop and a skip in Pennsylvania."
"At our current speed we will arrive within the hour." JARVIS spoke. Who also happened to be their pilot.
"Good." Steve looked at the picture for a bit longer before changing the subject. "Has there been any other sighting of Peter?" He turned away from the screen and faced Tony on the opposite side.
Tony shook his as he still looked at something on his screen. "Nothing official at the moment. Plus doesn't help they haven't actually released an official statement yet." Tony looked up at Steve but then looked at the picture of Piper behind him. "There were a couple of comments on that video that might of been true."
Steve crossed his arms over his chest. "Anyone look into it?"
Tony turned his attention back to his screen as he shrugged once. "They might of if it wasn't taken down."
Steve shifted his weight and turned his head to look out the front of the cockpit. Tony looked up at Steve and just rolled his eyes.
"What is it?"
Steve looked back at Tony with a concentrated look on his face. "I'm just not sure that's the best course of action." He uncrossed his arms and let them rest at his sides. "People might've been able to help out. Plus taking it down looks kind of suspicious."
Tony just shrugged with no comment. He then went back to reading over the extra file he'd gotten from the Paper Tower.
It wasn't too much longer until they started to descend as the neared Pennsylvania. After that it was only a matter of minutes until they landed in York Pennsylvania.
They were at another SHIELD base located near the edge of the state. This one was very similar to the one they just came from in Indiana. This one was just a lot newer.
They exited the jet on the roof of the plain 20-something story building. The sun shone brightly overhead, so Steve shielded his eyes with his hand while Tony slipped on a pair of shades. They walked towards the entrance which was an elevator leading straight down the entire building. If you have high enough clearance of course.
As they walked towards it, Steve spoke up. "So, did you actually check to see if she was still here or what?"
"Unlike our aquatic friend, Ms. Piper is very easily tracked." Tony tapped his wrist device to grant them clearance. "She's not scheduled to leave for another week."
Both Steve and Tony entered without a problem. As the elevator doors closed, cool air conditioner swept over them like a wave.
"Floor?" A robotic voice calmly asked them.
Tony looked at Piper's file and found her job location easily. "Medical and Physical."
"Right away."
The box smoothly descended; only passing a few floors. Apparently this floor was higher up. The elevator came to a stop and the doors opened to a long hallway with multiple rooms lined on both sides.
"Medical and Physical." The robotic voice spoke to them.
As they walked out, you could notice all the rooms were walled with glass. Most of them were labs with an open layout, Others were small offices; A fair amount of people were working at the moment.
When they walked by a total of three empty offices, they found one with someone inside. Steve gently knocked on the already open door with his knuckles.
The person sitting at the desk raised his head to look at them both. His dirty blond hair was a mess and his round frame glasses sat crookedly on his small nose.
"Can I help you?" He asked them as he readjusted his glasses.
Steve stepped in with Tony coming up right next to him. "Yes, we're looking for someone."
"Piper McLean." Tony jumped in. "We'd like to speak with her."
"Yes," The man stood from his desk and walked over to a shelf against the wall. "She just left an hour ago. She's heading back home for her break." He spoke in a mono tone and barely made eye contact with anything.
Steve raised an eyebrow at Tony, then looked back at the man. "Really?"
"Yeah, she said . . ." His voice trailed off and seemed to no long be speaking real words.
The man gripped his forehead before shaking his head as if to rid it of something. When he looked back at Steve and Tony he had a confused look on his face.
"What was I saying?" He asked them both.
Tony took a couple steps forward. "'Piper McLean had just left'?"
"She did?"
Steve adopted the man's confused expression. "That's what you told us."
"But she's not scheduled to leave for another two weeks." He furrowed his eyebrows as he looked around his office. His face remained bewildered as he went back to his desk and sat in his chair.
"You feeling okay, son?" Steve walked closer to the desk now with a worried look.
The man nodded then focused back on Steve. "I think so."
Steve readjusted his stance and held his hands in front of him. "Could you possibly tell us when you last saw Ms. McLean?"
"About an hour ago I ran into her in the hall." The man furrowed his eyebrows as he tried to concentrate. "She had her purse and some other things in her hands. Like she was heading out or the day.
"When I asked where she was going she told me that 'if anyone asked she was heading back home for her break.'."
"And?" Questioned Steve.
"And that was it."
Tony crossed his arms in front of his chest. "And you listened?"
"Look, I know it looks bad, but I don't know why." He looked between Steve and Tony. "It was so weird. I remember about to argue, but after she said that it was like my mind changed on it's own. It just made since all of a sudden."
"That's . . ." Tony trailed off slightly for a moment before coming back. "A little strange."
Steve kept his focus on the man. "Has something like that happened before?"
"No, I don't think . . ." He sat up straighter in his chair as he looked at nothing in particular. "There was that one time in the lab. She was working on some blood samples; testing them for the inhuman gene." He returned his gaze back to the two of them. "But when I offered to help she said To leave her alone and never to tell anyone I saw her in there. I hadn't thought about it since."
Steve and Tony exchanged a worried look. Or Steve was worried and Tony was a little more curious.
Tony changed his attention back to the man. "Why don't you rest for a bit. We'll check her office while you try to see if you can remember anything else."
He nodded in agreement. "Okay,"
"Could you tell us which office is her's?" Asked Steve politely; as per usual.
"Keep going down, it's the last one on the left."
"Thank you."
They exited the office leaving the very confused man behind. They followed his instructions and found Piper's office within half a minute.
The door was unlocked and swung open with a small squeak from the hinges.
Inside the office was very neat layout. It was nice and tidy unlike the previous man's office. There was a fresh bouquet of roses sitting in the corner along with a mini replica of the Eiffel Tower. Other then those things nothing else was really personalized. Not even a framed photo of a family.
There was the basic file drawers on the right wall and a sleek desk near the window. So there was plenty of space for childhood trophies or maybe one of those weird essential oil diffusers. Nothing.
After the both got a good look around, It was time to get down to business. "You want the drawers or the desk?" Steve swiped a finger across the dustless file cabinet.
Tony took one look at the desk and made up his mind. "Desk."
"Big surprise there." Steve commented dryly. "Could I get some help from JARVIS?"
"Whatever." Tony tossed the small disc from his pocket. It hovered about two feet from the ground before coming back up next to Steve.
"Afternoon, Captain." JARVIS greeted Steve.
"Afternoon. You mind helping me out here?"
"Since you asked so nicely."
JARVIS scanned the files just as he had at the Paper Tower. This time Steve was actually trying to help out.
No one spoke for the next few minutes or so. Tony had managed to make a complete mess where he was searching. After he'd pulled out every drawer and emptying out all of their contents on the floor he searched the inside of the desk. He looked for any secret compartments, maybe some cool code thing like in National Treasure. Nothing.
Well, maybe not nothing. As he was returning items back into drawers -not necessarily where they were before.- he noticed something stuck to the bottom of one drawer.
"Hey Steve, check this out."
Steve stopped reading a file he found and switched his gaze to Tony.
Taped onto the bottom of the drawer was a small folded piece of paper. Tony pulled it off and removed the tape that was stuck to it.
At this point Steve had put down the file was walking towards Tony. When he was standing next to him, Tony unfolded the paper.
"What'd we have here?" Steve rested his hands on his hips.
"We're 'bout to find out."
Written in a neat cursive was a short note that read, 'Thanks for the heads up.' Tony turned over the paper and a small electronic bug was stuck on the back of the paper. A part of the bug was a light that was flashing red and blue.
Tony passed the paper to Steve. "Well, Steve. You wanna take a stab what this is or you just want me to tell you?"
Steve examined the paper when he noticed something attached to it. "Well starters, it has a literal trip wire."
"Wow, that's one more idea than I thought you had." Steve gave it back to him with a stank face. "Don't get pissy on me."
"I wasn't finished." Tony gestured with his hands for him to continue. "From the note I'd guess it's probably a warning for her or something."
Tony rubbed his chin with his fingers. "The note was on the bottom of a locked drawer. Only reason someone would pull it out was if someone was rummaging through her stuff." He wiped his hand down his entire face. "Why she would feel the need to do that? I don't feel like guessing."
"She has something to hide, maybe?"
"Hmm, that does seem very possible." Tony walked around Steve and towards the door. Grabbing JARVIS from the air as he passed.
Steve followed right behind him and closed one of the drawers on his way out. "Everything's possible until proven otherwise."
"Whatever."
..::..::..::..::..::..
They both made their way out and back to the jet. Before exiting they made sure to check in with the man from earlier. He hadn't remembered anything else since they asked him before.
With a quick goodbye, they left the building. Being they only took one elevator it was pretty much impossible for them to get lost this time. Within minutes they were both back on the jet and waiting for JARVIS to takeoff.
"Whenever you're ready, JARVIS." Tony sat as he gave the order.
The jet roared to life. It then sipped up and out of Pennsylvania. After a few minutes they reached a safe altitude and evened out.
"Well, not much from that stop." It was Steve who said this.
Tony stood from his seat and joined Steve closer to the back of the jet. "Yeah, really was a let down. Ya' know?"
Steve opened his mouth to speak again but was interrupted by a loud bell-like ring tone.
Tony looked around the jet before realizing it was coming from right next to him.
Steve pulled out a cell phone from his pocket which is where the sound was coming from. The screen read 'Unknown Caller'. Steve pressed the green button and held the phone to his ear.
"Hello?"
"Hello, Mr. Rodgers."
Steve raised an eyebrow. "May I ask who is this?"
"This is Piper McLean. Looks like I missed you back at my office."
Edited 4/9/2018
Yeah, I made y'all wait 4 months for a short filler chap. You are so welcome BTW . . .
I actually cut out 1,000 words worth from this chap because they were being difficult and had it coming.
If it makes anything better, I'm planning on having the next chap to be A) Longer. and B) Way more interesting.
Umm . . . I don't really have anything to rant about this time. I also don't have a book suggestion. O_O
My reasoning (more like excuse.) is recently I've been reading more popular book series. Which = No book suggestions. If y'all like these THAT much, I'll have two next chap. But that's only if someone asks. I'll just be having the one next chap if no one says anything.
As always, Thank y'all so much for all your reviews! (And follows and favorites.) It always ALWAYS makes my day when you take the time of day to tell me what you thought of my story.
Usually this is where I would answer people's questions who I was unable to PM. But I didn't see any who I didn't message. If I didn't answer you're question, PM me again and I will answer to my best ability.
Only thing left to say is, Go to my profile and vote my poll. Obvs' you ain't have too but it's appreciated.
Thank you for your time.
No refunds.
-MFM
stay weird.
(P.S My birthday is next week. First person to guess how old I'll be turning can have a sneak peak of future chap or something like that. :P)
(P.P.S Congrats Nicholas Friar. Got it first try. I'll be a Dancing Queen. 17 if you don't know the song.)
